Packing, packing and more packing... Are we ready for our European adventure yet?

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Even before we left for our holiday to New Zealand we were already thinking about the next trip. It was going to be a longer one, so it was about time to start planning... and about time to book the tickets! We decided to leave it until we came back from New Zealand in the end though – making sure we could actually cope with travelling with a baby...

Since our New Zealand trip went better than expected, there were no more excuses! It was just a matter of deciding when we wanted to go and how we were going to break down the trip. It was almost April now, would 2 months be enough to arrange everything? I guess it would have to be as no more postponing... The end of May it was then! As we started looking for flights, one thing became very clear – we would need to make two stops before we reached Poland. Grant really wanted to go through Hong Kong, but the connections weren’t that great and they seemed quite pricey as well... Sorry! We would just need to look again at Hong Kong on the way back... That is if we were coming back. 😉 I guess we would just have to see where we would end up this time...

Finally the decision was made and tickets booked! Leaving on the 26^th of May to Singapore, spend a few nights there, then a week in Copenhagen and the final destination Elblag (flying to Gdansk and then a car drive back home). Now that we had the tickets booked, 26^th of May seemed quite far away in the future... 8 weeks to go! Surely we had plenty of time to arrange everything... Pack the house into boxes, rent it out, change the addresses, sell the cars, cancel this, cancel that... then there was Grant’s business to be taken care of still... did I mention he was still working? How many days was it until departure? 55? Whaaaat? It was meant to be stress free packing this time... Really? Just had to remind myself to take a few deep breaths and relax... we weren’t exactly leaving just yet...

The days were quickly going by though and suddenly it became 4 weeks to go... Millie decided to try out her commando crawling skills quite early so there wasn’t much packing done at all. I always wondered why mothers said they never had time to do anything? You would think that babies only eat, poop, play and sleep... I guess I never realised just how much time each of these activities could take... And what a ‘vicious’ little circle it could be... haha! With Grant working fulltime or rather being bombarded with orders and me on mum duty 24/7, we didn’t have much of a chance to start preparing for our trip... A couple of ‘big’ things done at least though – Grant’s business sorted and one of our cars sold! I guess the 4 weeks didn’t go to waste after all!

After that it all just became a slight blur... Days were slowly disappearing... but so was our stuff as well! 😊 I was just chucking out more and more things and passing the leftovers to Grant for packing while he did a fantastic job putting them into boxes... Definitely one of my favourite parts about moving – decluttering! Not that we had sooooo much stuff! But after making several trips to Vinnie’s I started wondering where all this stuff came from and whether we really needed any of it at all... As much as you’re trying not to accumulate too much stuff, it still manages to pile up somehow!

Some more packing in the last two weeks... travelling bags looking heavier and scarier by the minute... more and more furniture disappearing – only mattress left to sleep on, thankfully Millie’s bed is still here! Quick garage sale closer to the departure date... second car sold in the last week (pheeew!)... Are we forgetting something???? Naaah, slight panic even in Grant’s eyes tells me we were pretty tight with time but in the end we’re right on track or so it would seem... Last thorough cleaning of the house and house is ready to be rented out... All sorted then! How much time do we have left? Car it’s on its way to pick us up??? Whaaat? Ah well... Off we go then! 😊



Last night in Brisbane, no longer at our house though... We’re sitting in a hotel room and looking with slight horror at our 3 gigantic pieces of luggage (70kg! hard even to remember what’s inside there!), pram and 2 pieces of hand luggage... I guess that’s what happens when you’re packing for 3 seasons – as yes! we do have summer, autumn and winter in Europe. 😊 Just to make it to Poland and we’ll reorganise our stuff then... But first – time to sweat a bit more! Singapore, here we come!

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Comments

[D MJ Binkley]

Stunning
Love this one.

[AnnaW travels]

Thank you :) It was a beautiful stormy sunset that day. Thankfully camera was close by.

[Shelley and Scott]

I feel your pain
You sure brought back some memories of our last big trip when we did the same thing of clearing out of our house and renting it out. 6 months of my life I will never forget and the cyclone last two weeks were a nightmare, couldn't even imagine doing it with a small child at my ankles. This trip we just left house and contents with friends, missing the rent but was slightly easier exiting. Happy long travels.

[AnnaW travels]

I feel your pain
It definitely wasn't easy and we were constantly changing our minds whether to rent the place out or not... It feels like long time ago now... Happy we rented out the place in the end as we are not sure if we'll be coming back there at all... We'll see where this trip will take us. Happy travels to you too!